Into the Treeline Page 19
After a little while he opened them again. He was starting to hurt. Damn it, he thought, you aren’t supposed to be in pain when you’re dead. Reluctantly he came to the conclusion that he wasn’t quite there yet. He looked down at his body. Much of the blood had started to dry, though there was still some ooze on his legs and arms.
The pain got worse. Jim sat up, groaned, frightening the hell out of Captain Vanh, who had thought he was dead. Vanh had crawled out of the litter where the bearers had dropped him when the explosion went off, retrieving a rifle from a dead man, and had been laying down a base of fire at the ambushers while some of his men flanked them. He crawled over to his friend. “Claymore mine,” he said, needlessly.
Goddamn, I can’t hear a thing, Jim thought as he watched Vanh’s mouth move. He assayed movement, found that, while it was quite painful, it was possible. Time to ignore the pain. He was still clutching the CAR-15. There were several shiny areas where the Claymore pellets had struck it, but it appeared functional.
He pushed himself painfully to his feet, then advanced on the muzzle flashes, firing as he went. Vanh followed him. In this killing ground to stand still was to die.
The fire slackened as the ambushers started to break off the action. Jim and Vanh knew better than to pursue. To do that would only invite another ambush.
Jim shook his head to clear it. He could still hear nothing. Vanh was saying something, motioning for him to come back. He followed to the original site, passing bodies along the way. Most were in North Vietnamese khaki. But the ones at the ambush site were not. The positioning of the bodies and the type of wounds made obvious what had happened. The enemy had set up a Claymore mine on their route of advance and had detonated it when the point man got within range. The ball bearings, each the size of a double-ought buckshot pellet, propelled at a speed of over three thousand feet per second by the C-4 plastic explosive behind them, had reduced the point man to something that looked like chopped hamburger. By some freak accident the mine had been detonated when the column had been marching one behind the other, else the destruction would have been worse. As it was, the next two men in line were also dead, having received most of the projectiles that had missed or exited the first. Jim had been fourth, and had been hit by only a few, along with bone fragments from the others. He checked his wounds. For the most part they were superficial, though he could see that at least a few pellets had embedded themselves deeply in his thighs. Most of the blood and flesh he had taken for his own had been blown back from the men in front of him.
“How many more?” he asked Vanh. He could feel the resonance in his inner ear, but nothing more. He wondered if his eardrums were blown out again. He knew that others could hear him from watching their responses. “I can’t hear,” he said. “Use signals.”
Vanh held up three fingers, then drew his hand across his throat. Two fingers and a breaking motion Jim took to mean the number of wounded.
“Can they walk?”
Vanh nodded.
“Then let’s get the choppers in here. Call them up, tell them where we are reference the original pickup point, and that we’ll shoot a pen flare when we hear them. Tell them that it may be a hot LZ, so prep everything outside twenty-five meters from the pen flare. Okay?”
Vanh nodded again. He gave him the handset of the radio and watched as the Vietnamese spoke. Soon he gave the thumbs up signal, and held up five fingers. Jim took this to mean that they would be there in five minutes.
They pulled in the surviving members of the force and set up a small perimeter. The dead would be left in place. Jim didn’t like the idea, but there was no way to get them out short of clearing jungle, and they had no time or equipment for that.
How had the NVA known where to set up the ambush? They must have tracked the team almost from the landing, known which direction they’d take coming back, set it up with that in mind. But if they’d known that much, why hadn’t they warned the targets? He’d seen radios, both with the ambushers they had killed and in the camp they had attacked. Again the feeling that something was very wrong came over him. If the ambush had been set up just a little better they would all be lying dead here now. No witnesses on either side.
No time to worry about it now. He sensed the vibration from the helicopters, their blades disturbing the heavy silence of the jungle. Vanh fired a pen flare. Jim knew that the pilots were confirming the color of flare before they came in. The gunship started working over the surrounding foliage with rockets and miniguns. He could not tell if there was any return fire.
The rope deployment bags came crashing down right into the center of the perimeter. Vanh directed five of his men, including the two wounded, to hook up. The other rope he offered to Jim, who shook his head. He had never left before all his people were off the ground, no reason to start new habits now. Vanh said something to him, offered the rope again. He cupped his hand over his ear, said, “Can’t hear you, buddy. Get one more man on that thing and quit wasting time. That chopper is exposed as hell sitting there like that.”
Vanh ordered another man over, hooked him up. He spoke into the radio again. The slack was quickly pulled from the rope as the chopper ascended. The weight of the men slowed the ascent rate slightly, but it was evident that the pilot wanted to get out of there quickly, as he increased lift and raised them high. The trees were thirty to forty feet high in this area, and within moments the men were above them. Jim watched approvingly as the pilot took them even higher before he started forward movement. It was such a pleasure dealing with professionals. Perhaps this would be one time that he would not have to endure being skipped off the treetops.
Then the chopper was away, and the second in place. Only four of them to hook up this time. He snapped in, saw Vanh speak over the radio again, soon felt the tug as the slack was taken up.
The muzzle flashes and the roar of gunfire came again. Some were directed at them, some were obviously going for the helicopter. Oh, shit, he thought. Vanh was screaming over the radio. The soldier beside him jerked twice, then went limp. Jim returned fire, one magazine, then fumbled through his pouch for another. The harness being pulled tight by the rope made it difficult to get them out. Then he had one in his hand, started to insert it in the magazine well, and watched it tumble to the ground below as with a great jerk the pilot applied lift and forward motion all at the same time. He just had time to raise his hands in front of his face before hitting the first tree.
The gun went first, stripped from his hands by grasping branches. He hit one big limb, then another, knocking the breath out of him. They were banging into each other, trying to hold on, trying to turn so that their backs would take the brunt of the beating, but it did no good. The foliage bounced them about like puppets on an elastic string. One man’s foot got caught in the vee of a limb; the helicopter kept pulling, obviously lugging down with the load. Then with a tearing sound audible even over the roar of the gunfire the foot tore loose, bouncing them twenty feet as the nylon rope contracted.
He could only hope that they would gain enough altitude before someone got caught worse. It was standard procedure, should the people on the string get snagged badly, to cut them away. It was unlikely that any of them would survive the fall.
His shirt and pants were in shreds, exposing bare flesh to the tearing. I can’t take much more of this, he thought despairingly. Maybe it would be better to be cut away. He thought about trying to get the knife out of his web gear, but was afraid he would lose it before he could do anything.
Then suddenly they were above it, bouncing once, twice on taller trees before getting enough altitude to avoid them. The helicopter pilot obviously wanted to get as far from the ground fire as he could, was pulling pitch for all he was worth and trying to climb.
Jim looked up for the first time, saw oil and smoke streaming from the fuselage. My God, will it never end? It didn’t seem that they were climbing, were far too close to the ground. The chopper had to be losing power. Too much weight.
He very carefully removed the K-Bar knife from its place on his shoulder harness, thankful that he always kept the blade honed. “Good-bye, my friend,” he intoned, then slashed the rope. The body fell, tumbling, to the jungle below. It was swallowed up, not even a splash, not a sign that he was gone. Like a burial at sea, he thought.
The helicopter, freed from the weight, leaped upward. He could see the face of the crew chief peering down at him, perhaps assessing whether there was anything worth saving down there. He waved, I’m alive, goddamn it! The radio was, of course, gone, stripped away like the rest of their gear.
The head disappeared. After a few moments, when he felt no sudden slack in the ropes, Jim figured that they were going to try to make it. The helicopter was still smoking, but seemed to be running okay. His vision was blurry, one eye puffing shut from a blow. He twisted to see the others. Vanh was hanging limp. No! he cried. Not that. He grabbed him, felt a slight movement. Neither of them had many clothes left. He looked terribly vulnerable. Jim hugged him close, trying to protect the frail flesh.
The chopper continued to climb, the air growing cold, the wind sucking away body heat. He knew they wanted to get out of the range of the ground fire that even now searched for them, but wondered if the cost would be that they would freeze to death. The other survivor, who through his cuts and bruises Jim recognized to be the training NCO, pulled in close and together they huddled.
They flew for no more than thirty minutes, but it seemed to be forever. He realized that they were not going in the direction of Phu Bai, supposed that they were trying to get to the nearest friendly location. His mind was fogging from the cold, but at least it had the effect of killing the pain.
He saw the cleared area approaching, far ahead. Roughly in the shape of a star, a “new model” Special Forces “A” Camp. Barbed wire surrounding it, the jungle cleared away to provide for the interlocking fields of fire he knew they would have planned. When they got closer he could see vehicles, then people running toward the X shape marking the helicopter pad. Would they make it? The helicopter seemed to be descending far faster than necessary.
Then they were over the pad, and being lowered gently to the ground. Jim tried to stand up. His legs would not cooperate. Hands pulled at them, unsnapping them from the ropes, drawing them quickly out of the way, placing them on stretchers. A wide moon face looked down at him, grinned. “Might have known it would be you, Jim,” he said. “You look like shit.”
Jim realized that he could hear again, though the man sounded like he was speaking through cotton wool.
“Thanks, Clyde,” he croaked. “You should see how it looks from the inside.”
There came an agonized grinding from above as the gear case of the helicopter finally ran out of fluid and came apart. “Run!” cried someone, as the helicopter fell out of the sky. It hit hard, the landing skids splaying out to the sides, the tail boom fracturing and falling to the ground. The main rotor, frozen in place by the seizing of the gears, snapped.
He was left on the stretcher as the others ran back to the helicopter to rescue the crew. He saw fuel spilling from the tanks, watched as it ran over the hardpacked ground toward him, tried to get up. Even the abject fear he felt could not overcome his body’s refusal to act. It was as if his muscles were saying, Enough! If we die, so be it, we will go no further.
They were spraying the copter with foam from hand extinguishers, getting in so close they were standing in the fuel while others pulled the crew out. The pilot had to be cut out of his harness, was pulled from the side, clutching his stomach. His nomex suit was wet with blood, pooled in the crotch, the excess soaking down his legs. He had obviously been bleeding for a long time. His face was white.
One crewman was dead, his neck at an awkward angle. The other, blood streaming down his face, insisted on helping them take the body off. So much loss. So many of the PRU dead, and now these. For what purpose? So that they could kill a couple of VC. And some children? Don’t forget that part, Jim.
“Could’ve been worse,” Clyde said, returning to where he lay. “Could be raining.”
“Fuck you, Clyde,” he said weakly.
“That’s the spirit. Now let’s get a look at you. Where are you hit? Haven’t practiced being a medic for a while, but since you cross-trained me, I shouldn’t be too bad. What goes around, comes around, eh, Jim?”
“My stuff is minor. See what you can do for these other guys. My captain is in pretty bad shape, I think.”
“Nah. Already checked him. Knocked unconscious, but he looks okay. Don’t worry, we’ll take care of everybody. Hell, we’re used to it. Get a recon team in here at least once a week that’s been shot to shit. So lie back and enjoy.”
“Where the hell are we?”
“Camp Mai Loc. Newest addition to the string of Special Forces forts that will help to monitor, interdict, and harass cross-border movement of the North Vietnamese army. According to MACV, in any case. A real shithole of a place. Better get to the bunkers now. Almost time for the daily rockets. Pick up the captain,” he said to two of the Montagnards. “Treat him gently. Far as I know, he still owes me money. Can’t have him dying before he pays me back.”
At the underground dispensary Jim was, once again, given a shot of morphine. I could grow to like this stuff, he thought, shortly before thought went away.
Chapter X
The Medevac chopper came later that day. By the time it arrived he was able to walk around by himself, though with some difficulty. He refused further shots of morphine, thinking that he liked it entirely too much for it to be good. The pain from his wounds was intense, but bearable. Clyde Truby supported him as he walked to the chopper.
“What the hell happened out there, Jim?” he asked. “Tried to talk to some of your people while you were out, but they weren’t saying much.”
“We fucked up. Walked right into an ambush. Damndest thing I ever saw, an ambush right out in the middle of the jungle. Wasn’t a hasty, either. They had plenty of time to set it up.”
“You think maybe you’ve got a leak?”
“I think we’ve got a flood. I just can’t figure where. Would seem damn stupid of one of the people to set up an ambush that he was going to walk into. Unless he thought he wasn’t going to walk into it. Big question, of course, is whether he was one of the survivors.”
“Better you than me, buddy,” Clyde said. “I thought I had enough trouble keeping this camp together. NVA sure as hell don’t like us. Not that we’re doing that much good keeping them from crossing the border. But they know that we’re a launch base for CCN. The Recon boys are giving them hell over there. They’ve had to divert a hell of a lot of people to guard their rear areas that could be over here fighting. The Recon teams avoid fighting if they can, call in some damn fine air strikes on the convoys on the trail. Used to be pretty easy to do. Not so easy anymore. We’re losing a bunch of them. That’s why we built the launch sites close to the border. Think you saw what could happen if you had to fly all the way to Phu Bai on a string.”
Around them the strike force was cleaning up the mess from the morning’s rockets. There was no serious damage. Most of the camp was built underground, in reinforced concrete bunkers. The only major structure aboveground was the latrine, which got blown away regularly. The only casualty thus far suffered among the Americans had been in that latrine. One of the team members had been a bit slow in clearing the spring-loaded screen door, which had come forward and slapped him in the back. It had hit the butt of his .45, which for ease of access he had always carried cocked and locked. The pistol had gone off, cutting a groove down his leg and plowing through his foot. He had been evacuated to the music of the
rest of the team’s jeers and catcalls. That he might have endured, were it not for the fact that Clyde had promised to put him in for the Purple Heart. Now he’d have to hear about it for the rest of his career. One thing about the SF. You could go on a hundred combat missions, distinguish yourself every time, and nobody would think anything about it. But if you screwed up one little time…some people called it the “Pierre L’Artiste Syndrome.” As in “I paint a thousand pictures, and nobody calls me l’artiste, but I suck one little dick and everyone calls me le cocsuckaire!”
“You take care of yourself, Clyde,” Jim said as he got on the helicopter.
“Shit, that’s easy,” Clyde scoffed. “I’ve already decided I’m going to survive this war. They haven’t got me by this time, they’re not going to. But you keep fucking around like this and you aren’t. Find out who your leak is. Get rid of him. Then seriously consider going into another line of work. Imagine you could find yourself a nice staff job somewhere if you wanted to.”
“Yeah. If I really wanted to.” He waved good-bye as the helicopter took off. The other wounded were in stretchers. Some of them did not look good. The medic aboard moved constantly among them, checking this one’s IV, the vital signs of another, making sure that the bandages did not come loose and let someone bleed to death.
He relaxed as well as possible, letting the vibration of the chopper lull him into a half sleep. Soon he would have to worry about the leak. Soon he would have to confront what had gone wrong with the mission. Soon he would have to think about the children. But that could wait for just a little while.